March 15 2026
John 15:1-17
I always find it interesting how I can go for great lengths of time and never even think about something from my past and then within a month I am reminded over and over of that earlier time. It has been eight years since I participated in Kairos Prison ministry yet just recently I have had three occasions to talk to people about that experience.Well, as I recall those times, I remember that just being involved with the group of men who participated in Kairos ministry was in and of itself a tremendous blessing. Those who kept coming back again and again to take the gospel into Belmont correctional were some very special people who helped me grow immensely in my walk with Christ. As I considered today’s scripture, the Lord put on my heart a special conversation I had with one of those men who served on the Kairos team. It happened on the morning before we were getting ready to head out to Belmont from our lodgings at a camp. We had just finished breakfast, and as we were getting cleaned up, my friend Wally pulled me aside and asked if he could speak to me privately. Of course, I was curious just what he need to talk to me about, so we went and found a quiet corner to talk together. Wally is a loyal follower of Christ, so I knew that whatever he had to say that it would be something that would at least be God-honoring. Yet, even so, I was not quite prepared for him to confront me about something I had done that had slighted him, and he felt that I should be aware of what I had done. It seems that while the team ate breakfast and we talked together while we ate, I had talked over Wally, completely cutting him off, so that what he had to say did not get heard. Ouch! Now, you see, Wally knew that Jesus had given us instructions about what we are to do in such a situation, something that I believe might surprise most Christians. You see, in the eighteenth chapter of Matthew, we are told that if we have something against someone, like, say they ran rough shot over the conversation we were trying to have, then the one who is hurt is to go and confront the person who harmed them so that the hurt and the subsequent anger could be dealt with before it got out of hand. As painful as it was to be confronted about my lack of social skills, what Wally did for me was in fact a gift. You see, by confronting me about my transgression, and then offering me forgiveness, Wally was giving me a chance to correct an area of my life that was in need of work.
As I thought about what Wally had done for me, I also became aware that he had done this difficult work of confronting me, not just for me but more importantly for the work of our Kairos team. You see, when we went into Belmont, it was important for us to witness to the difference that Christ makes in our lives. If we were not intentional about our love for each other then it would be quite difficult for the inmates to believe our intention to love them as well. You see, what Wally did for me was an act of love, to confront me so that I could be corrected in my actions not just toward him but everyone. When we hear in our scripture from the fifteenth chapter of the gospel of John, the command of Jesus is that we love each other in the same manner as Jesus has first loved us. Now, in the context of the last supper the disciples would have with Jesus, the love Jesus is speaking about is the love he demonstrated when he went to the cross, so that his body could be broken and his blood shed for us. This love that Jesus showed to us upon the cross is a love just like the love shown to me by Wally, a love that both confronts and corrects us so that we might be able to love with the cross shaped love of Jesus.
Now it should come as no surprise that we would find ourselves at the foot of the cross because the cross is the very focus of this season of the church calendar which is called Lent. Lent is the forty day period before the arrival of Easter which begins on Ash Wednesday. These forty days are reminiscent of the forty days that Jesus spent in the wilderness being tested before he begins his ministry. So, the church set this time aside so that those who desire to be baptized on Easter might have a time to be tested before they begin their ministry.
What we are using to guide us through this Lenten season are the conversations Jesus had with his disciples on that last night with them before he was glorified there upon the cross. John, in his gospel account, has recorded for us a very different account of that evening because what his concern was was that when people consumed the elements they may not realize that they are to lead us to the cross where Jesus died. As we eat the bread, we are to pause and wonder, just why was the body of Jesus broken? What Jesus tells us in the thirteenth chapter of John is that the body of Jesus was broken because Jesus has forever united himself with the broken and crushed people of this world. This is the way that Jesus serves every person, by representing them when the world judges them to be less than human. This judgment occurs because the world is driven by our appetites, our lusts and our pride. So when we encounter people who are of no help with our purposes, when we experience people who give us no pleasure, or when people are of no use in the fulfilling of our plans, then it becomes easy for us to simply write them off. We limit our love to only those who will return our love shown to them. How easy it is to justify not showing love to others and then place the blame for our not loving them on there being something about them which causes us to withdraw our love. Our excuse for limiting our love is actually that we have judged some people to be simply not worth our time or effort.
Well, what great comfort it is to us to discover that Jesus has forever united himself with those judged by the world to be the least of these, those people that are so easily cast aside. It is these who the world writes off that Jesus finds worthy to be written into his story. Jesus came as a servant, and he serves us by uniting himself with all who have ever felt the judgment of the world, those who have been treated as being somehow not-quite human. Jesus calls those who follow him to join him in becoming united with those who the world has no use for, to serve them, because when we do so we will find that we have also served Jesus. Jesus looks at all the despised, unwanted, uncared, people of this world and he honors them by telling them that they are equal in status to him. This is why Jesus can say at the end of the twenty-fifth chapter of Matthew that when we have shown any love to the least of these that we have, at the very same moment, shown love to Jesus. So the way we are cleansed from the pollution of this world is that we serve as Jesus first served us, by uniting ourselves with all those the world has no use for.
Now when we unite ourselves with the least of these, then we have united ourselves with Jesus. This means, as Jesus explains in the fourteenth chapter of John, that the home he shares with the Heavenly Father, is now our home as well. The Holy Spirit, the God who walks along side of us, is given to us so that we might experience the life and love of heaven right here on earth. Through the power given to us through the Spirit we are able to live as those worthy to inherit the world. We at last able to love without limits because the Spirit, who is given to us without measure, pours into our hearts the very agape love of heaven. So when we drink the cup, the life of Jesus poured out for us, we remember the Spirit who has been given to us to be our source of life and love. As Paul teaches us at the beginning of the twelfth chapter of Romans, by the mercy we receive from God we are to present our bodies as a living sacrifice for this is our logical worship, which keeps us from being conformed to the world.
Today, then we come to the fifteenth chapter of John. Here we must not forget that Jesus and the disciples are still at the table. They have eaten the bread and they have drunk from the cup. Through doing so, the disciples were to remember that in order for them to live the good life, the very goodness of God, they were to adhere to the teachings of Jesus which told them good was when they hungered and thirsted for righteousness. Righteousness is when all people are known as being equals, and this is possible because Jesus on the cross has made himself equal with all those who have found themselves judged unfairly by the world. And to do good also means that we are to be always willing to offer mercy for our God always offers us mercy, a mercy heard at the cross in the words of Jesus, who cried from the cross, “Father forgive them for they no not what they do.”. This is why we know that horrible day as being for us, “Good Friday”.
Well, today, Jesus speaks to us about how we are to bear fruit. Now, this should not surprise us because, as we learned in the first chapter of Genesis, after God blesses us humans then the expectation is that we would be fruitful and multiply. As we also learned in Genesis, bearing fruit is when life brings forth more life. So this says to us that from us is to flow a life giving stream. Jesus begins his illustration of the vine by stating that he is the true vine, the true way of life that the Father has always expected. Now just so it is abundantly clear, Jesus straight up tells us that if we are united with him, and this union with him does not produce good in us, then we can no longer think of ourselves as being one with Christ. We should take this as a very sober warning. In response, we should desire to know how can we remain united with Christ, the one who calls us his equal. What Jesus tells us is that we must bear fruit and when we bear fruit we can expect that God will prune us, or better, God will cleanse us in order that we will bear more fruit. Jesus then tells his disciples that they are already clean because of the word he spoke to them. This is a reference to what Jesus had done earlier in the evening when he washed the disciples feet. As Jesus came to serve us, so too we who have been served by Jesus are to serve those who need our service. We are to remember that Jesus served us by allowing his body to be broken. So the way Jesus cleansed us is first by uniting himself with us when we have been judged by the world, condemned by others to be something less than the humans who judge us.
The pruning, or cleansing that our Father does to us though, this is something different than what we have already learned. You see, the truth is that, yes, we have been judged by the world, but if we are honest, we too have been the one pointing the finger at someone else, judging someone else as being something less than human. All of us, as Paul teaches us in the third chapter of Romans, have fallen short of the glory of God. We fall from glory anytime we fail to see the glory of God in someone else. We all are guilty of doing this because all of us begin as people driven by our desires, chasing after the fulfillment of our appetites, seeking to obtain what we lust after, and doing whatever is necessary to increase our pride. In doing so, we have left behind people who have not suited our purposes, we dismiss those who bring no pleasure into our life, and we have no use for those who did not fit into our plans. You see, Jesus knew all of those people that were left hurting in our wake, whether we were aware of doing so or not. In being the sinless Lamb of God, Jesus is the one who represents all of the victims of everyone’s evil judgments. So when we come before the cross, we are confronted by our sin, for Jesus is every person who has suffered because of how we judged them. So, while we have great comfort because Jesus unites himself with us when we find ourselves judged unfairly by the world, now when we admit to being one of those who are guilty of wrongly judging others, the broken body of Jesus confronts us about our sin. Just as my friend, Wally, confronted me about the harm I had done to him, so too the broken body of Jesus confronts us about the harm done to him anytime we judge someone else in a hurtful manner. We witness this confrontation in the ninth chapter of the book of Acts, where Saul is confronted by Jesus as he walked on the road to Damascus. Jesus asked Saul, “Saul, Saul why do you persecute me?” When asked whose voice this was who was speaking to him, Jesus replied, “I am Jesus who you are persecuting.” Can you imagine the shock when Paul realized that Jesus, the righteous Judge had united himself with those Paul had harmed. Imagine the terror that came over Paul when he at last understood that his sin was a direct affront to the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. And so it should with us as well, for every time we have harmed another we certainly have done the very same act against the one called Jesus.
So, as we eat the body of Jesus which has been broken for us, we are to be confronted about how we are treating others. We are to not make excuses, putting the blame for our failure to love without limits upon those we have harmed. A lack of love on our part is never due to someone’s lack of love toward us; no, the reason for our resistance to loving others lies solely with us. So the broken body of Christ confronts us so that we can confess that we have sinned when we have chosen to limit the reach of our love. Yet, there is more than our just being confronted with our sin because not only has the body been broken but the blood of Christ has been shed. The blood is necessary for our forgiveness. So, even though when confronted with our sin, nevertheless, we are assured of our forgiveness because of the blood. This forgiveness is given to us so that we might correct our transgressions. We are to know that when confronted about our sin we always have the opportunity to correct our course, and turn and come back to Jesus.We come back to Jesus for we know that only as we abide in him, can his life and his love become our own. So through our reliance on Jesus, abiding in him, and then allowing his words, to live in us, we are at last able to bear much fruit. The word that is to live in us is the good Jesus expects from us. Jesus expects that we be those who hunger and thirst for righteousness and those who offer mercy to all just as Jesus first has done for us.
Yet, we are still not ready to bear fruit because not only must Christ upon the cross confront us out our sin so that we can confess that sin, and not only must we correct our course but now we hear Jesus call out to us to take up our cross and follow him. Jesus calls us to be his disciples, those who copy him and love through taking upon ourselves our cross. We are to love just as Jesus loved us, allowing our bodies to be broken by the brokenness of the people of this world. As Paul tells us in the fourth chapter of Second Corinthians, we are to carry in our bodies the death of Jesus, uniting ourselves with the suffering of this world, so that others might see in us the life of Jesus. The life of Jesus is mercy. So as we show mercy to the suffering by joining in their suffering, and by showing mercy to those who wrongly judge us unworthy, we prove our commitment to living a new way of life. The result is fruit and more fruit, life and more life. In this way we do the good which glorifies our Heavenly Father, now and forever. Amen!
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